Olympian Christine Magnuson Visits Glassdoor And Talks Life After Swimming

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Photo Courtesy: Lenny Gonzalez

Commentary by Scott Dobrowski and the Glassdoor Team

Glassdoor has Olympic fever! From the U.S. to Dublin to London, we’re all cheering on our respective teams, staying up late into the night to catch all the winning moments. So when word spread that a champion swimmer would be visiting our offices, excitement hit a fever pitch.

So who was this month’s Speakers’ Series keynote? Two-time Olympic medalist Christine Magnuson.

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Photo Courtesy: Lenny Gonzalez

With medals in hand, Magnuson took a break from the nail-biting excitement of watching her fellow swimmers take to the Olympic pool in Rio to visit Glassdoor’s Mill Valley, California offices. Speaking to a packed room, the six-foot-one-inch phenom shared stories about everything from getting pep talks from Michael Phelps, being cheered on by Kobe Bryant at the Beijing Games, and, most importantly, what it takes to transition from athlete to 9-to-5er at a San Francisco consulting firm. (Hint: She used Glassdoor!)

Kicking off the interview with Glassdoor’s Director of Corporate Communications, Scott Dobroski, the 29-year-old Magnuson began by clearing up a few things. Unlike most Olympic athletes, the Illinois native did not grow up with pictures of diver Greg Louganis on her wall and certainly didn’t announce to her elementary school class that she had dreams of Olympic grandeur. In fact, it took several years for her to imagine the famous interlaced rings.

“I wasn’t the typical 8-year-old [swimming hopeful],” said Magnuson. When people told her in as a teen that she could go to the Olympics her answer showed typical adolescent attitude, “You’re nuts,” she recalled saying, “It’s not a sign-up.”

However, after focusing on swimming in high school then honing her skills at the University of Tennessee, a vision of standing on the winners’ podium came into focus. Training twice a day, 30 hours a week and forgoing the typical splurges of a twenty-something gave her the chance she had been waiting for.

But what about the pressure? All that nervousness? Nope, she had a plan to suppress jitters. How? A dash of blissful ignorance. “Me and my coach did not talk about making the Olympic team,” she said emphatically. “I did not let it into my thought process. I went to Trials to have fun with my teammates, to put together a really good race. It set me up to win.” And win she did.

However, upon arriving at the Olympic Village in Beijing, China, there was no way she could ignore the magnitude of the moment. Surrounded by thousands of athletes from around the globe was, Magnuson said, a “bubble of amazingness” only made better by her fellow USA swimmers. Oh, and then there are those two silver medals she scored, one for the 100 butterfly and another as part of the 400 medley relay team.

So after that, Magnuson’s life was filled with job offers, endorsement deals, and non-stop partying, right? Not quite. Don’t worry she did not experience a tragic fall from grace. Nevertheless, post-Olympic life was filled with “daunting” decisions and somewhat of a quarter-life crisis.

“You find yourself asking, ‘Do I go for another four? Do I transition out of my sport? How am I going to pay for everything?’ Meanwhile, your family and your sponsors are pulling you in all sorts of directions. That first year is really hard. I decided to go for another four years, but there are moments that you are and there are other moments when you think it’s so cool to travel the world and swim.”

While she aimed to swim at the 2012 Olympics, Magnuson fell short of qualifying for London by 0.05 seconds. A huge blow to both her ego and her support team, she “went dark” for two weeks, not watching the sport she loved, but all the while crafting a post-swimming plan.

“The Olympics is such a high and then you come back,” she recalled of the professional low point.

Thanks to her “teacher parents,” Magnuson always had a firm grasp on the existence of “life after swimming.” In 2010, while still eyeing London, she went to the University of Arizona to get her Masters in Public Administration. Her backup plan was instantly activated once she recovered from the London let down, but she found herself facing yet another challenge: her resume.

While many college students pursue internships in the summer and build up work experience, Magnuson didn’t have much in the way of traditional professional experience. And as Dobroski mentioned, she couldn’t simply bring her silver medals to a job interview and say, “Hire me!”

“It was really hard because there is not an obvious translation between being an Olympic athlete, representing sponsors and [then] working in a 9-to-5. There was a learning curve.”

The key to translating her skills was networking with the vast community of other former professional athletes. Magnuson shared with the audience of Glassdoor employees that her first job after the Olympics was obtained through an existing contact, just like so many other job seekers who don’t have Olympic medals to show for their lack of experience.

“Glassdoor was a big help for me researching the company culture and the reviews of companies, so I could get more of an insight,” admitted Magnuson, who was able to identify what companies were looking for and then prepare answers for how she could address interview questions of culture fit. “I also looked at what jobs were out there and what they pay.”

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Photo Courtesy: Lenny Gonzalez

As the hour long chat between Dobroski and Magnuson continued, she revealed advice for how other athletes-turned-professionals could tackle big office challenges much like they would compete. After all, she can relate to what it’s like to go from controlling eating, training, and split-second outcomes to an office environment where personalities and company fluctuations make things harder to control.

“Take your bigger goals and challenges, and break them down into pieces that you can control and set progress goals along the way,” she says. When she was on her first Olympic team she remembers telling herself “ I don’t want to be the weak spot on Team USA,” and now as a sales client partner, she gives herself the same pep talk. “I don’t want to be the weak spot in my company.”

So what’s next? Aside from texting Michael Phelps to clown him about his death face and swapping #PhelpsFace memes while watching the races, Magnuson is a lot like other almost-30-somethings still figuring it all out—well, sorta.

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Photo Courtesy: Lenny Gonzalez

Traveling the globe as a motivational speaker and mentoring other former athletes on her outside-the-pool lifehacks, is far from normal. But her best advice can be applied to every job seeker and employee: “You don’t need to win every day, just stay focused on the process and the end goal.”

Re-posted with permission from Glassdoor.

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